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Culture War Roundup for the week of December 16, 2024

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Most likely mass hysteria. Are there any compelling videos that aren't obviously traditional aircraft flying in normal ways/astronomical bodies/hobbyist or commercial drones doing normal hobbyist or commercial drone things?

So why is the House Intel committee receiving a classified briefing on the mass hysteria? Is this standard procedure for mass hysteria?

receiving a classified briefing

The classified briefing could just be "we have no idea what these sightings are." It could be classified even if it is mass hysteria for any number of reasons. Perhaps the briefing reveals something about our radar/intelligence capabilities. Perhaps the military has no idea what these things are and on the off-chance they really are drones from Russia/China/Aliens they don't want to reveal how little we actually know about them. The government routinely investigates a bunch of stupid shit, Stargate Project?

Edit: In effect, I think the likelihood of a classified briefing is essentially equal whether this is real or mass hysteria. To me all it reveals is that there is 1) enough public outcry to demand congress investigate it and 2) this investigation to some extent entails consulting our military intelligence capabilities.

If your agency will give classified briefings in the case there is something shady going on but publicly denounce mass hysteria, then the very fact that they are giving classified briefings would be an information leak. So I would fully expect the CIA to give a highly classified briefing on bigfoot (likely "to our best knowledge, it does not exist") to Congress if they demanded it.

When people start pointing green lasers at commercial airplanes then maybe there is something worthy of a briefing.

Do you genuinely believe that the briefing is about actions that civilians have taken in response to the drones and not about the drones themselves?

Again, I’m not sure if there’s really a precedent for that sort of thing.

I wouldn't discount that possibility. If people are violating Federal laws in hysteria then maybe something needs to be done.